As any social media site grows, it has to deal with many issues and one of them is that wonderful fake meat, SPAM. Now, unfortunately, what each of us considers “SPAM” is different. Furthermore, our culture and belief systems also affect how we see the actions of others, a piece of information to one is a piece of SPAM to another. Ultimately, the answer is to give you control of how you interact with our platform. Now, admittedly, we are not perfect and we’ll be rolling out more options to add to your growing arsenal of site customizations.

So let us go into the many wonderful ways in which you can control and report abuse and SPAM on Empire Avenue, including a new feature we just rolled out: The “Mute” button.

Mute
If you want to prevent someone from posting on your profile or sending you a message, you can now “Mute” them. The button appears next to a post they made on your profile. You can still buy shares in them, and they can still buy shares in you, but you might not hear from them otherwise. Currently, Mute does not extend to Shareholder Mail, but it will in the future. You can manage your Blocked and Muted Users List from your Settings page.

Block
This is much more severe. Blocking means each person cannot invest in each other and if you had investments in each other, the blocking actions will do an automatic sell at market value. Visiting someone’s profile will also show next to no information. Shout Outs and Messages will also be blocked! The Block button is one each person’s profile, just scroll to the bottom. You can manage your Blocked and Muted Users List from your Settings page.

Privacy Settings
Every user can control what class of person can post on their profile and send them messages. For example, do you not want your Shareholders to message you? You can set that up. Remember, becoming too private may affect how you grow your network, Empire Avenue is about meeting people and discovering those of great value. Check your Privacy Settings!

Harassment, Abuse and Spam: Report!
Every profile has a report button. If someone is being abusive, please report them. We’ll investigate as quickly as we can, do realize that while we take all reports seriously, some are more serious than others and we will be quick to act if enough evidence is available. A social site should encourage good behaviour, but if you cannot participate with a modicum of respect, we will, unfortunately, have to take action.

We want your time on Empire Avenue to be spent having fun and meeting great people.